Wednesday, October 21, 2015

My school is one of a few that has adopted an innovative model for parent-teacher partnerships. We started at the beginning of the year and it is going fantastic. It's called "Academic Parent Teacher Team" or APTT.

APTT replaces the traditional parent-teacher conference with three group meetings throughout the year, where teachers meet at once with all parents in their classroom. Each parent is provided with a folder of their child's performance indicators. Teachers then provide an in-depth coaching session on how to interpret the data based on overall classroom performance, school benchmarks, and state standards. Teachers provide the parents with strategies and tools to help support learning at home. Our goal this year is sight words (Dolch) for our grade level. I have started assessing my kids for the end of our first quarter and I'm blown away with a majority of my student's progress with their sight words and their fluency!!! Some of my students have improved by 50 to 80 sight words. Their reading levels have gone up right along as well. I can't wait to see what the end of this school year brings to all of us involved! I am so proud of my class for working so hard and for my families working together to make this all happen.

Click above to watch the video

Since our grade level is working on sight words I thought I would introduce you to a fantastic website called "Cram"! It is a website with more then 50 million flashcards and it now has a text-to-speech function. There are flashcard sets that are already created that you can use or you can create your own.

I went to the website and looked up the Dolch sight words and there are plenty of lists to use without me having to create my own.

There are several different ways that you can search on the website. I did two different searches; I searched by subject and then I searched with specific search words (dolch).

Click Here to visit the website!

The audio content of Cram has almost 20 languages for your non-english speaking students. You do not have to sign up, but it is quick and easy to do if you want to.

Cram also has a large app store so you can find other mobile flashcards for your Android, iPhone or Windows device.

Try it out and let me know what you think about Cram and if you are an APTT school also!

SURPRISE! If you read all the way to the bottom you have an awesome FREEBIE waiting on you! Just click the image to download. It's Fall Ya'll!!!

Wednesday, September 30, 2015

As you are getting ready for Parent/Teacher conferences in October, I want to introduce you to Jooners.

click here to go to the website

Jooners is an online signup sheet that allows you to create, manage, and share your events from anywhere you have internet access. You have the choice to sign up for an account or just click on the "Create Sign Up Sheet" without creating an account.

Why do I need Jooners? Well, you know that Fall Festival that is coming up? How about a class party that is coming up and you want to be organized? How about a book fair and you need volunteers? How about if you want volunteers for your classroom and you want parents to sign up? Get the idea? Now think of other ways you can use Jooners to make your teaching life easier! You can create your own from scratch or you can choose from the examples that are already made. Notice that there is one listed for Parent/Teacher Conferences?

The ones that are already made can also be edited to meet your needs. I used it last spring for conferences and it saved me a LOT of time!

Take a moment to watch the video to get more ideas. Try it out and let me know what you think and how you used it to keep your classroom/event organized!

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

The Who's Who authors are holding a fundraiser for a little girl named Fiona from Indiana.

Three year old Fiona Waller’s only cure is a bone marrow transplant...her medical bills are overwhelming as well.

Fiona was born with a rare, life threatening immune deficiency which requires her to undergo painful weekly infusions. A bone marrow transplant would replace her defective B-Cells and T-Cells. Karen Waller, Fiona's mom worries that, "the only other option is to continue treatments and wait until she gets sick."

The family’s medical insurance requires an $8,000 out of pocket deductible each January.

Fi’s medical bills totaled over $80,000 in the first 6 months.

To help this wonderful family with expenses for this beautiful baby girl, Who's Who is holding a fundraiser to help pay for her medical bills. Our initial goal is to raise enough to pay for the family’s 2016 deductible. Maybe we can even raise enough to pay for the actual bone marrow transplant!

All proceeds from the sale of these educational resource bundles, will go to Fiona and her family. Please check out some of these resources from the links below. You will get some AMAZING resources AND you will be helping out a family in need.

Sunday, July 26, 2015

OK, this may or may not surprise most people, but I don't have cable. I was honest and said NO, that I wasn't watching TV. I am officially a "cord cutter" and watch only what I want to watch on Netflix and Hulu! How about you?

Saturday, July 18, 2015

My summer is just about to be over in a little over a week. I have seen pictures of people already preparing their classrooms. UGH! I have a ton of boxes sitting in my house ready to go into the truck to head over to my classroom.

Last year I think my kiddos were eating glue sticks. They all brought in their own personal glue sticks and by April we were OUT! I knew glue sticks were going to cost me so I came up with another plan. One that I could use from year to year and consider it an investment. I bought these bottles and filled them with glue. I found them on Amazon and if you click the image below it will take you to the ones I bought.

These cuties are 2 ounce bottles and they come in a pack of 12. I only bought one package and it was enough to make it to the end of the year. This year I am going to have them out as an option for anyone that wants to use them instead of glue sticks.

I added the liquid white glue to my "wish list" for my classroom, so hopefully I won't have to buy too much of it on my own. I also had a shoebox tub that I used to store the bottles in so it all worked out. Try them out and see what you think!

Wednesday, July 1, 2015

OK, I haven't watched children's television in a LONG time. I am out visiting grandbaby #3 in California and loving every minute of it. Tomorrow I have to leave my sweet baby and head back home and I am so sad!

I have been taking care of her during the day and every morning we watch Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, which is basically Mr. Rogers animated. So that is why I am listening to it with her because she loves the characters, colors, and music.

I am LOVING that I got to spend two weeks with my sweet baby and had such a wonderful bonding experience with her.

I am THINKING about how I have to leave tomorrow and fly back to GA and get back into the real world again. I know most of you are just starting your summer but in about three weeks I have to be back in my room getting it ready before teacher work week. UGH!

I am WANTING to be able to spend more time with Anna, but I need to go back home...

I did not turn my "teacher brain" off this summer so I have been busy!!!

Sunday, June 7, 2015

Hi All! It's Deb from Fabulously First bringing you a fabulous teacher tip for reading!

click here to visit the website

Have you signed up for "Teach Your Monster To Read"? What is it? Why is it free? I can answer all of those questions!

The program is funded by the Usborne Foundation, a charity set up to support initiatives to develop early literacy and this is why it is free. The program is for children in the first stages of learning to read, or for older children who need a little more practice. "Teach Your Monster to Read: First Steps for the iPad is $4.99 which I feel is a bit pricey. The reason I say that is because Raz-Kids is web based and the app is free to use on the iPad.

If you are interested in learning more about this program please click the picture above!

You do have to sign up or sign in.

Here is the app if you are interested in taking a look at it for your devices.

After you have signed up you add players one at a time to choose which game they will play (see below) or sign up multiple players!

Hang on there are some great options:

I love that I can change their passwords to something kid friendly on a keyboard. There is even a place where you can download the stats via excel. They also provide password cards for each student to log into the program. What's not to love?

Yeah, there is a lot more to the program, but I gave you the basics to get started and it is FREE!

If you already use it or if you sign up, please let me know how you like it.

Friday, June 5, 2015

Got a busy summer planned and would someone please tell me why I have already started creating a list for things to do for next year? Seriously?

I am planning a trip to California in about two weeks and would you believe I didn't have a laptop case for traveling? I know I like being at home but I need to get out more. So I had to buy a laptop case. I wanted to have a really nice one for twice the price but this one will do...

OK, so I also realized that I don't have luggage to fly out to California so I had to go shopping again. I bought something inexpensive because how many times do I use luggage? Hardly Any! So I ended up with this...

Now, this flight is going to be FIVE HOURS and I am not one to embrace being five feet off the ground. What am I going to do for five hours, on a plane, in a squishy seat? I am going to read a book...

Something has to keep my mind off the fact that I am up in the air and not on the ground!!! Being captive on a plane will do this to a person; self- induced professional development?

Oh, and I did shop for something for my classroom for next year. I am getting RID OF MY DESK and using my kidney table. I needed something for all my desk stuff to go into so I bought the three drawer containers from Walmart. Hey, a teacher has to do something with all that JUNK right? So I bought these...

Last, but the most important part to ALL of this insanity, it to hold this little darling right here. I am meeting her for the first time and when I do I know I am going to fall more in love with her then I already am. SHE is worth all the luggage buying, laptop purchasing, and flying on a plane for five hours. I just know she is going to be SO spoiled by the time her GMA is ready to go back home.

This is my cutie pie already getting her "duck face" on. Isn't she the cutest?